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This was a great find a few years back and it felt like I was on the set of a British version of a US teen slasher movie based on one of their summer camps. The holiday park was used in the Channel 4 reality series Wakey Wakey Campers in 2007.

Of all the places I’ve visited, this one left me with so many mixed feelings. By the very nature of what the site was, people came here and enjoyed happy times, away from work, with friends, sunshine and cabaret & entertainment. Yet when I visited it, without the people, it became the loneliest place on earth.

The site no longer exists so I am proud that these photos provide an archive of the site before it disappeared forever.

History

This disused holiday park operated between 1935 to 2007 and was an example of the changing habits of British holiday makers.

History about this is quite sparse also the last action the site saw was when it was used as the set for a Channel 4 reality documentary Wakey Wakey Campers where film makers recreated a 60’s holiday camp and recorded the experiences of modern day holiday makers. This was in 2007 and then has remained closed.

Permission was given to redevelop the site and by April 2017 a new park should exist.

This wonderful find is easy to discover and can be clearly seen from the roadside. The lodges are simply shells although the elegance and isolation of past status is still there. It appears that restoration (or at least stabilisation) is happening and the properties would make amazing holiday retreats.

These lodges known as Kilmersdon lodges were the principle entrance to the estate and haven’t been used since the mid 20th century.

History

Ammerdown House in Kilmersdon, Somerset, England, was built in 1788. It has been designated as Grade I listed building.

It was built as a country house with stables and an adjacent formal garden within landscaped parkland in emparked landscape by James Wyatt for Thomas Samuel Jolliffe. The house has been handed down through the Jolliffe family to William Jolliffe, a politician, who was made Baron Hylton in the mid-19th century; the house was enlarged in 1855 & 1877, with further alteration to the west front being undertaken in 1901, possibly by Sir Edwin Lutyens.

A pair of lodges, gate piers and gates, associated with Ammerdown House, which were also built in 1788–94 by James Wyatt, are Grade II* listed buildings and on the English Heritage Heritage at Risk register. Since 1973 the stables have been significantly altered and converted into a study centre.

The orangery and walled garden were built around 1793.

In 1853 John Twyford Jolliffe & Thomas Robert Jolliffe, the children of the builder of the house, Thomas Samuel Jolliffe, built a 150-foot (46 m) high column, known as the Ammerdown Park Column, Ammerdown Lighthouse or the Jolliffe Column. It was a near replica of Eddystone Lighthouse with a glass dome or viewing lantern which could be illuminated. It is a Grade II* listed building.[5]

The gardens include gothic fountains and statues surrounded by mature yews nearly 4 metres (13.1 ft) high, hedging, Portugal laurels and honeysuckles trained over wired umbrellas. Spring colour is provided by daffodils, cowslips and magnolia with roses, dahlias and wild orchids flowering in the summer.The gardens are listed, Grade II*, on the Register of Historic Parks and Gardens of special historic interest in England.

The current residents of the house are Andrew and DIana Jolliffe, the son and daughter in law of the 5th Baron Hylton, the current Lord Hylton. The family estate covers many of the villages around including Kilmersdon, although much of the former residential property of the estate is run by a charitable housing association set up by the current Lord Hylton.